This invention is directed to disposable sheaths for endoscopes and more particularly to a low profile disposable sheath that provides effective flushing of surgical debris from the viewing end of an endoscope.
The term surgical debris is intended to refer to any body material such as blood or tissue that lands on the viewing end of an endoscope during surgery and obscures the field of view through the endoscope.
Endoscopes permit remote visual examination of a surgical site while a surgical procedure is being performed. During surgery, blood, tissue or other bodily material from the surgical site can splatter onto the viewing end of the endoscope and obscure the field of view through the endoscope.
In some instances it is necessary to remove the endoscope from the surgical site to clean the viewing end, which usually interrupts and undesirably prolongs a surgical procedure.
Because of the inconvenience of removing and cleaning an endoscope during surgery, some surgeons prefer to use an endoscope with a sheath that has provision for flushing away any surgical debris that obscures the view through the endoscope.
Known endoscope sheaths, such as shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,991,565 and 4,974,580, are usually custom fitted to the endoscope. The sheath can include air tubes, water tubes and suction tubes to flush away or suction out surgical debris from the viewing end of the endoscope. The irrigation, suction and air tubes on the endoscope sheath can add significant girth to the profile of the endoscope and require an incision of corresponding size to accommodate the endoscope and sheath.
Since many endoscopes are of different length, a diversity of different size sheaths are required to custom fit each different length of endoscope with a sheath. Large inventories of customized endoscope sheaths of different length are generally maintained to ensure compatibility with each different endoscope.
It is thus desirable to provide a low profile endoscope sheath that is adaptable to a variety of different endoscope lengths and can effectively flush debris from the viewing end of the endoscope.